A PIANO RECITAL NOT TO MISS: AN EVENING WITH RAVEL on 26 April 2025

 

AN EVENING WITH RAVEL 

If you love piano music, here is a super piano recital not to miss, showcasing the complete piano works of French composer MAURICE RAVEL (1875-1937). No less than 22 pianists in Singapore – young virtuosos as well as concert veterans – will take part in this 150th anniversary commemoration of Ravel’s birth. This marathon event takes place at Victoria Concert Hall on Saturday 26 April 2025, starting at 7 pm (Please note the earlier timing!) 

Although Ravel was no piano virtuoso,
he wrote some of the greatest piano music ever.

Ravel’s virtuosic showpieces, like Gaspard de la nuit and Valses nobles et sentimentales, sit alongside his Impressionist scores – Jeux d’eau and Miroirs – and neoclassical favourites, such as the Sonatine, Pavane for the Dead Infanta and La tombeau de Couperin. Here is also a rare chance to hear his miniatures and excerpts from the ballets Mother Goose and Daphnis and Chloe as well. Two of Singapore’s well-known piano pedagogues Rena Cheung and Nicholas Ong also unite for a grand performance of La Valse. 

All the pianists (in alphabetical order): Isabelle Agethen, Libby Chan, Rena Cheung, Max Choo, Elizabeth Michelle Heryawan, Nicholas Ho, Samuel King, Dorotheus Koh, Lukas Franklin Lai, Enzio Lim, Lim Wei Xuan, Liu Xiao Miao, Ng Xin Yee, Nguyen Phuc Bao Tien, Luther Ong, Nicholas Ong, Ong Weng Yee, Michelle Purnomo, Kevina Tenggara, Teo Wei Syuen, Rebekah Too & Kseniia Vokhmianina 

Saturday, 26 April 2025 

Victoria Concert Hall, 7 pm 

Tickets available at: 

https://www.eventbrite.sg/e/an-evening-with-ravel-tickets-1207461272169 

Now watch these great videos: 

Ivo Pogorelich 

playing Gaspard de la nuit: 

Martha Argerich and Nelson Freire 

playing La Valse:

WHAT DO YOU REGARD AS THE GREATEST PIECE IF PIANO MUSIC EVER COMPOSED? / Results of Pianomania Poll

THANK YOU for your votes in the first Pianomania Poll of 2010. There was a very respectable 174 entries over six months, and here are the results:

NO.1: BACH'S The Well-Tempered Clavier
(63 votes, 36%)

Johann Sebastian Bach's 48 Preludes and Fugues in two volumes, in effect 96 separate piano pieces, gets the top vote. From childlike movements (the first Prelude) to the most daunting of fugues, this is the ultimate statement of artistic expression. Never mind if it were meant to be merely keyboard exercises of counterpoint. Bach was a genius through and true. His Goldberg Variations (4th position) and The Art of Fugue polled 17% and 10% respectively.

NO.2: LISZT'S Sonata in B minor

(38 votes, 21%)

Frequently derided as a showman and charlatan, this is Liszt's singular great single movement work, combining technical devilry with sublime expression. Other Romantic works that scored were Rachmaninov's Préludes (10%), Schubert's Sonata in B flat major D.960 (8%), Schumann's Fantasy in C Op.17 (5%) and Kreisleriana (4%).

NO.3: CHOPIN'S 24 Préludes Op.28 (32 votes, 17%)

24 short pieces, some barely lasting a minute are part of this wonderful mosaic, which finds some of Frédéric Chopin's easiest and most fiendish music. A roller-coaster of a ride that takes one to the expressive heart of the ultimate Romantic.

NO.5: BEETHOVEN'S Hammerklavier Sonata Op.106

(27 votes, 15%)

Pollsters have deemed this as Beethoven's greatest piano work, coming ahead of his ultimate Sonata No.32 Op.111 (9%) and Diabelli Variations (6%). Must have been that monstrous fugue that made the difference.

NO.6: RZEWSKI'S The People United Will Never Be Defeated!

(20 votes, 11%)

A surprise entry with a good 11% is American Frederic Rzewski's 1976 cult classic, comprising 36 variations on a Chilean socialist anthem. Well ahead of other 20th century classics, including Messiaen's Vingt Regards (5%), Sorabji's Opus Clavicembalisticum (4%) and Charles Ives Concord Sonata (under 1%).

DO WATCH OUT FOR THE NEXT PIANOMANIA POLL!